"Just stand here, wait ten minutes, then cast," said SteveT as he unhooked another fish. The school is in.
SteveT, Eric and I were fishing a rising tide near an area we fished a few days ago. The trade winds were howling at 15 to 20 miles per hour, making casting a little difficult. But the water was clear and the bonefish were biting. At least at this spot.
When we arrived on the flats we split up and fished different areas but after 30 minutes neither Eric or I had any takes. But SteveT was deep into some fish. After watching him hook up for a third time I walked over to see what was going on.
SteveT was fishing a deep pocket in the reef. He explained that he had already hooked five and landed three bonefish and since they were all around the same size, it must be a school feeding in the area.
"The fish will scatter when you hook one, but wait for awhile and they'll come back," said SteveT. "They're swimming around this deeper area in front of us." I looked at the fly he was fishing and selected a similar one from my box. As I was tying it on he cast into the area, hooked and landed another fish.
When I was ready he showed me where to place the fly and we waited around 10 minutes to let the fish settle down before I began to cast. On my second cast it was fish on and after a brief fight I brought a bonefish to hand. This was great. I called over to Eric and told him to come down to this spot.
We explained the situation to him and got him into position to deliver a cast. However after two casts a pair of jet skis, in a highly illegal move, blasted over the flats right past the spot we were fishing and scattered the school. After they passed the fishing went from hot to icy cold.
Steve told Eric to fish in front of us, parallel to shore. We fished behind and to the side of him. A few minutes later he hooked and landed a decent bonefish and followed that up a few minutes later with another fish. However the tide had bottomed out and it was time for us to leave because we had other commitments to keep. But landing 7 fish in a few hours fishing wasn't too bad.
EQUIPMENT: Eric and I used 8 and 9 weight fly rods rigged with Monic Tropical Clear line or Scientific Anglers Bonefish line and fluorocarbon leaders. SteveT used a Sage 7 weight switch rod with a Rio Outbound line tipped with 15 feet of fluorocarbon leader.